Ship project history: Five more light cruisers were
ordered in June-July 1917, basically repeats of the Ceres class, bur with
a raised 'trawler' bow to prevent spray from blanketing 'A' and 'B' guns. Stem height have increased by 1.5m at the expense of what the forecastle deck
fwd from "A" gun had enough steep slope.

"C"type cruisers were created for service in the North Sea under
1915 year design and become obsolete to the beginning of 1930th, and in 1935 the decision to convert them
to AA ships was accepted.Update of
prototypes Coventry and Curlew has appeared successful, and during the period 1936-1940
it was planed rearm similarly remained 11 "C"
type ships. However the program has been put aside, and only in 1938 works on
Cairo and Calcutta have begun. Unlike first two
ships they received twin 102mm mounts and only one quadruple
pompom. They became operational in May and July, 1939
respectively. In the middle of the same year works on Carlisle have begun. It was planed that other
ships of class will follow them but the begun of war was compelled to be limited to end of works on this
ship which has become operational in 1940.
Program was restarted only in 1942, when update have passed Colombo (June, 1942 - March, 1943).The arms structure on her significantly differed from
others: the number of 102mm mounts was cut to three, but means of
small calibre AA guns have significantly amplified. After conversion of Colombo and last Caledon the program have ultimately
ended: there was no sense to spend means for obsolete ships.

Naval service: Calcutta was sunk by German
Ju 88 bombersNW off Alexandria 1/6/1941. Cairo
was sunk at Bizerte by Italian submarine Axum 12/8/1942. Carlisle was badly damaged by
German Ju 87 bombers 9/10/1943,
she was not repaired and used as escort forces
depot ship in Alexandria. Capetown was damaged 8/4/1941 by a torpedo
from Italian MTB MAS213 and repaired till July, 1942.